Particularly in today's technological computer era, arcade games and other electronic devices have become very popular. As electronic games have increased in popularity, more casino-type games are enjoyed in a pure electronic format. One example is the usage of video poker. In concept, video poker is enjoyed similar to traditional poker games and is designed to replicate many aspects of a hand of poker. The video poker systems generate the deck or decks of cards based on an algorithm or a form of a random number generator, electronically produces visual representations of cards on a display device, and allows a user to determine which card to “hold” and which cards to “discard”. The system then displays visual representations of replacement cards for the cards the player has discarded. The player wins or loses based on conventional poker hand rankings for the resulting five card hand.
While many aspects of the card game are recreated with the above mentioned systems, they lack several aspects of traditional card games and are prone to alteration and deception. For example, users of the electronic systems do not know if the machine really creates an accurate “deck” of cards, since there are no physical cards to verify. The users have no idea what algorithm is being utilized to “randomly” draw the cards and cannot be certain the software has not been altered to fix the odds. This is even true for a shuffling apparatus that “determines” the position within a deck a card will be placed according to a random number generator.
Previous attempts to meet demands from the industry and players alike have their limitations. One prior art attempt discloses a method and apparatus for automatically shuffling and cutting playing cards. The systems, however, still required a live dealer for manually scrambling the playing cards. Another system attempted to randomize shuffling by randomizing a cutting process within a stack of cards, however, cards in-between the “cuts” remain in proximity to each other and are not scrambled. Another attempt was directed to a shuffler having a shuffling mode where a stack of cards are fed into card storing spaces (or individual compartments) of a magazine. The cards are randomly allocated in a storage space of a magazine through the use of a random number generator and the cards are separated into the magazines rather than being intermingled.
Thus there is a need for methods and systems that enable players to enjoy amusement-type card games with assurance of accuracy and fairness. There also is a need to recreate traditional aspects of “live-dealing” in a card game. While semi-automated dealing machines have been utilized, there are no dealing machines currently available which can accurately recreate a dealer's shuffling and scrambling techniques. These and other advantages are successfully incorporated in embodiments of the present invention without sacrificing the element of amusement that many desire.